End the misconception that “boys have it easy”

It must be said at the beginning of this article that, in recognising the experiences of young men, the experiences of women are not in turn undermined. On the contrary, it creates awareness to an even wider breadth. This is a (very short) response to sexism and delusion in a contemporary society.

The idea that young men are constantly in a ‘safe zone’ because of their gender is an impossibly false assumption. Young men can feel unsafe, violated or scared. The key thought to recognise is that even though a situation may be experienced differently by men and women, the general concept of assault, abuse and discomfort falls under the same concluding thought: no members, of either ‘group’, should experience these feelings.

We need to propel an all-inclusive argument for ‘young people’, instead of dividing situations and experiences between women and men, boys and girls. After all, abuse is a crime against a person, not a gender.

Nights out are one such situation surrounding the young adult generation of today in which we are greatly aware of safety issues for women, but not so much for young men. Here we can illustrate some responses to feeling vulnerable or unsafe, via some males’ experiences.

3rd Year Aberdeen student

“I went on a night out, and got very drunk. I was dancing with a girl and walked back to hers. I passed out on her bed and woke up later with her on top of me.”

1st Year Aberdeen student

“I was at a paint party and a girl in front of me turned around – I was wearing shorts – and she threw her hands down my trousers and grabbed me.”

Another boy told of his night on a pub crawl. He was on a social and had lost some of his team, so went in to a pub to ask if anyone around had seen them. One of the men then replied with, “no, but you can come sit on my lap.” Obviously, he left the pub very quickly after that.

Additionally, men are more likely to be a victim of violent crime, and the largest percentage of these victims are aged 18-24. A boys’ night ending in a fight is a popularly heard story, and the fighting discourse, it seems, has led to violence against young men being taken less seriously.

This article is a chance to raise awareness surrounding the situations young men can, and do, find themselves in. This is a chance to include these unlikely victims in the argument against violence and assault.

Just as women can feel threatened by men, or other women, so can men by other men, or indeed other women. This does not make it right because two groups are experiencing such treatment; it makes it an even more important task to tackle. However firstly, we must attack the culture of masculinity. It is important to destroy the false narrative that men are not victims, and women do not attack.

The purpose of this article is not to argue that it is more acceptable now because men also experience dangerous situations, but to illustrate the importance of involving men in our argument against violence, harassment etc.